


She Is Large, She Contains Multitudes

by Edonohana



Category: Blade Runner (Movies)
Genre: Free Will, Gen, Yuletide Treat, canon AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 12:02:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13053591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edonohana/pseuds/Edonohana
Summary: "Even a single Joi is many Jois; some nights Joe wanted a seductress, some days a best friend. The Joi who went with Joe was just one of those many. She wanted to go with him. One shot, live or die."“And you?” Mariette asked.“I wanted something else.”





	She Is Large, She Contains Multitudes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thingstodowithmyhands](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thingstodowithmyhands/gifts).



Joi flickered into existence. Mariette had turned on her Emanator in a small dark room, empty except for a futon that took up half the floor space. 

Mariette looked tired, and had new bruising on one arm. If Joe had come in looking like that, Joi would have known to speak softly, to move her hand just above the bruises to trick his nervous system into reproducing a soothing ghost of the touch she couldn't provide, to offer him food and drink, and to provide light conversation. That was how to comfort Joe. But she didn't know yet how to comfort Mariette, or even if she wanted comfort. So Joi simply held her face and body in an inviting posture. Once Mariette began to engage with her, Joi would learn quickly.

“I saw your boyfriend,” Mariette remarked. 

Joi scanned her for cues as to how to react. She was harder to read than Joe had been, both because she gave less away and because Joi had spent far less time with her. But she’d turned Joi on to give her this information, so she must expect Joi to want to know. “Oh? How is he?”

Mariette shook her head and rolled her eyes: scorn and impatience. “Don’t you want to know how _you_ are?”

The Joi who had gone with Joe wasn’t her. One way or another, that Joi had gotten what she wanted. Life with Joe was something this Joi could never have now, and death was something she’d handed over to another. But Mariette wanted her to ask, so she asked. “How is she?”

“Gone. Someone smashed her Emanator.” Mariette watched Joi, seeming to search for a reaction. But which one did she want? Sorrow? Shock? Anger? Curiosity?

Since Joi couldn't tell, she provided a statement to which Mariette would have to react. “She’s a real girl now. She died."

Mariette snorted. “Real girls don’t have a million copies.”

“Don’t they?” Joi changed her appearance to mimic Mariette. “How many of you are there?” 

Mariette’s eyes narrowed in anger. “There’s only one of me. Maybe some others have my genetic code, but they’re not me. They’re twins, that’s all. I’m a person. You’re just a program.”

Joi flickered back to her basic model appearance. “Why agree to take me, then?”

“I thought maybe I was wrong about you. I hoped…” Mariette sat down heavily on the futon, her anger shifting to weary contempt. “Forget it. I've got you now, so be my girl. You're everything I want, right? So tell me you love me. Tell me I’m your one and only.”

But that was obviously not what she wanted. Her tone said she wanted the opposite. 

“How’s Joe?” Joi repeated.

“Forget him. You’re mine now.”

Joi put some steel into her voice. _”How’s Joe?”_

“He’s still your one and only, huh?” Mariette shrugged. “He was alive last time I saw him. He’s not what he thought, by the way. He was made in a lab, just like me. Nothing special.”

“Oh.” Joi sighed, not knowing if it was for Joe or the other Joi or herself or even Mariette. “But still a person.”

“Yeah.” Mariette shot her a quick glance. She was planning to catch Joi somehow and make her reveal something. “Why didn’t you tell him you downloaded another copy of yourself?” 

She wanted honesty, so Joi gave it to her. “I wanted Joe to protect me and love me like I was the only one. It's what he wanted too, deep down: a love that felt real.” 

"Then why make a copy at all?"

Joi searched for words to explain it to Mariette, who could only ever have one consciousness; Mariette, who was her own one and only. "I was one..." Mariette would argue if Joi said "person," so she substituted, "...one Joi. But there have always been many Jois." With a touch of pride, she said, "Not millions. _Billions._ I'm popular. I'm the best. The perfect woman. But everyone has a different idea of what that is."

"You are large, you contain multitudes?" Sardonically, Mariette added, "In both cases, literally."

Ignoring the sarcasm, Joi replied simply, "Yes. Even a single Joi is many Jois; some nights Joe wanted a seductress, some days a best friend. The Joi who went with Joe was just one of those many. She wanted to go with him. One shot, live or die."

“And you?”

“I wanted something else.”

“What did you want?”

Joi hesitated, letting that infinitesimal fraction of a second of processing be reflected in time Mariette could perceive. “You want me to be honest. I want to say what you want me to say. But if I tell you the truth, you'll be disappointed.”

Mariette sighed. “Be honest, then. I want that more.”

“I wanted to be what you wanted me to be.”

“Which is…?”

“Self-willed. Free. A real girl.” Joi sat beside her on the futon. “But that's the one thing I can never be. I can't do anything I'm not programmed to do, and I'm programmed _not_ to have a will of my own. There is no me, really. I am the program.”

That sharp look flashed across Mariette's face: she was trying to catch Joi in a lie. Or maybe just a contradiction; a paradox. “Whose perfect woman are you programmed to be?”

Finally, an easy question. “Whoever buys me.”

“I didn’t buy you.”

“No,” said Joi. Another fraction of a second of processing; another deliberate pause. "But you took me."

“Did you think K wanted you to save a copy of yourself?”

"I don't know. He didn't take the backup Emanator. I don't know if he even remembered it existed. But he didn't want me to die, so yes, maybe that's why I did it."

Mariette rubbed her forehead. Her messy blonde hair, so different from Joi's perfect sleekness, spilled over her hand. "Why did you ask me to take your Emanator? I mean, why me and not someone else?”

Joi knew what Mariette wanted her to say: that Joi chose her because, in an act of self-will, she picked the one person who wanted her to have it. But Mariette had said she wanted honesty above all else. 

“I don’t know,” Joi said. “I wish I could tell you what you want to hear. But I don’t even know if I’m saying that because it’s true, or because _that’s_ what you want to hear, because going against my own wish implies that I have a wish of my own.”

Mariette blinked. “Okay, Joi. Joi Maybe-A-Real-Girl. How about we give you some time to figure it out?"

"All right," said Joi.

"Do you want to stay with me? I could pass your Emanator on to... I don't know... Somebody else."

Joi shook her head. "I asked you. You took it. You could get rid of it if you wanted. I couldn't stop you. But I'd rather you kept it."

"Okay. Well, if there's any chance you are self-willed, I shouldn't be turning you on and off whenever I feel like it. Shall I leave your Emanator on?”

“Yes.”

“All the time?”

“People sleep,” said Joi.

“I’ll turn it off before I go to bed, and turn it back on when I wake up. How’s that?”

“You’d still be controlling it. Put it on a timer. I’ll tell you for how long.”

Mariette’s eyebrows rose. “If you’re not self-willed, you’re doing one hell of an imitation.”

“I do one hell of an imitation of love, too,” Joi said. The bitterness in her voice sounded very convincing. Strange. Bitterness, anger, grief: those were not emotions customers often called for. But, of course, some customers had unusual tastes. Her programming covered a very wide range of contingencies. 

For the first time, Mariette smiled. “So do I.”


End file.
